To think rapid weightloss in the morbidly obese isn't an accurate representation of weightloss for most people?

[Halfadamnlb]

I'm currently 10st 7 and want to get down to 9.5st, I'm overweight but not obese.

I've been making changes to my diet and lifestyle for a little over two weeks and giving it my all.

Daily walks for at least an hour, sometimes two hours.

No sugar in my hot drinks and I've switched from whole milk to skimmed.

I have cut out all unhealthy snacks like chocolate and crisps which I was eating most days.

I'm eating smaller portions at dinner time.

Drinking alot more water.

Doing some light cardio at home in addition to the long walks.

I have lost a measly 0.5lb, if that.

Meanwhile on a weight loss group on Facebook there are women bragging about having lost 12lbs in a bloody week.

The people who are posting this type of loss are, in their own admission, morbidly obese.

Therefore, in my opinion, such losses aren't representative of the reality of dieting for most people.

It's demotivating to work so hard on something and see such a miniscule loss then to read somebody has lost 12lb and done so well by "just cutting out takeaways"

AIBU?

You're a great bunch here, I wish I posted sooner.

I'm definitely interested in the bootcamp and have PM'd BIWI.

Today is a new day and one which I'll embrace and make better choices.

To lose 2lb a week you would have to burn 2200 calories a day which at your weight is unlikely. The walking is great but won't be burning as many calories as you hope.
I suggest you work out your TDEE from a calculator online putting in light exercise and assume they are your figures to work on. I'd guess your TDEE is closer to 1900 than 2200. Aim to lose 0.5-1lb a week and be pleased with that. At your weight it's never going to come off quickly.

The 0.5 loss has been gained back now according to my scales this morning so it feels as though it was alot of effort for nothing

If I'm right in that my hormones are a big part of the problem then won't any further effort be in vain? I don't know that I have PCOS, but I have alot of hormone related issues. Acne, extreme PMS etc.

What can you do when hormones are such a contributing factor?

If you've lost 0.5lb of fat then that loss won't go away unless you overeat again for a week, which you haven't. Water weight can cause you to fluctuate by several lbs and having a period, heavy exercise, alcohol and salty food can all cause water retention. You must not get obsessed by the number on the scales.

What can you do when hormones are such a contributing factor

How much of a contributing factor are they?

A mug of ovaltine (250-300 ml) made with milk is quite high in Calories, much higher than you are recording (over 200 Calories).
I would suspect that you or the app are underestimating Calorie intake and overestimating Calorie expenditure on exercise. Try doing the calculations manually, weighing everything you eat carefully carefully. But keep going with the exercise, you will be fitter and healthier even if weight loss is slow. IME about one pound a week is more realistic than any more. Also bear in mind fluid retention from hormonal fluctuations which can have a significant effect on weight.

It won’t be your hormones, if you’re eating few enough calories you’ll lose weight. It’s a combination of eating miscalculated exercise calories, and underestimating the calories in what you’re eating.
3 weetabix with milk and a cup of ovaltine is almost 500 for breakfast alone.

Be really careful with accuracy with calories, stick under 1200 and don’t count exercise calories, and YOU WILL LOSE 💪👍
Regardless of any possible hormonal condition.

@Eckhart

What can you do when hormones are such a contributing factor

How much of a contributing factor are they?

I'm not too sure, but I suspect a fair amount.

Since having my two DC they have gone haywire and I have lots of hormonal issues that I didn't have before. I struggle with acne and severe PMS, both hormonal.

BIWI confirmed my gut feeling when I said I suspect some of the problem is down to that.

Since recovering from my ED some 6 years ago my diet has always been the same and I've never gained (or struggled to lose) as much as I have since having DC and developing these hormone issues.

A mug of ovaltine (250-300 ml) made with milk is quite high in Calories, much higher than you are recording (over 200 Calories).

I think you're right there. No way is it 56 calories as stated in the MFP app. I always feel quite full after having one.

3 weetabix with milk and a cup of ovaltine is almost 500 for breakfast alone.

Quite, I didn't look at it that way (thanks my fitness pal)

I'm going to cut out the ovaltine.

I've always noted how filling it is so it seemed bizarre that it would only be 56 calories.

I had one with my breakfast (which was Greek yoghurt and fruit) but I'll switch to tea now.

I have PCOS too. I always suspected it but had a diagnosis when symptoms and then and ovarian scan confirmed it about four years ago.

I think that’s why my body needed an extra kick at the start of weight loss- I had to battle the insulin resistance first and hit fat burning mode. I still lost next to nothing in the first few weeks and was exercising a lot.

I tried to really cut back to carbs just from fruit and veg initially but it made me feel unwell after about a week of doing it (I think the ketones and general hypoglycaemia were bad for me and I vomited a fair bit and felt rubbish). So I added more carbs in and settled on having two small carb portions a day (so piece of toast with eggs for brunch and small amount of rice, pulses, potatoes or pasta in evening with veg and protein).

Alongside intermittent fasting (7pm until 11am), exercise, cal counting and increasing water I slowly lost 24lbs over around 5 months.

I think it’s about finding the balance. With pcos I think drastic carb reduction is perhaps less well tolerated as the body doesn’t have good glucose control- if it’s in deficit it takes longer for the liver to be signaled to produce sugar from glycogen stores leaving you feeling ropey in the meantime.

That's impressive @shenanigans5 you've done really well.

Can I ask what symptoms you had that lead to your diagnosis?

My GP isn't enthusiastic about investigating further than offering me contraceptive pills which only make things worse (for me)

I have been drinking alot more water over the course of the past fortnight so that might account for my weight reading going back up slightly.

I'm probably going to stick to weighing once a week as PP's have suggested so I don't get too critical of minor changes.

I am sure you are on the right track with all the advice on here. For example the question of the calories in the pasta bake. Check the calorie content of the dry pasta and weigh before cooking, as well as other ingredients, and especially any oil or fat.
In general 1g of carbohydrate or protein is 4 calories, 1g of fat is 9 calories. So 100g of dry pasta will be about 400 calories when cooked, and if 20g of oil is used in the sauce that would be another 180 calories etc.
Good luck!

Ovaltine is full of sugar - drinking 3 or 4 a day is 5 tablespoons of sugar. I would save the Ovaltine for a weekend treat. Drink tea, coffee, water or plain milk instead.
Drinking sugary drinks is about the worst thing you can do diet wise. That may well be why you aren't losing the weight in spite of all your other changes.

I think the app assumed only 100ml of milk for the ovaltine but a normal mug would be more like 250 or 300ml. This is why it helps to weigh and measure everything and do the calculations yourself. I am sure you will succeed as you obviously learn very quickly and have identified possible problems with the app calculations.

Carbs control insulin. Insulin is a big contributary factor in PCOS. Carbs are strongly related to inflammation. Inflammation is strongly related to skin problems.

I would suggest dropping carbs drastically, just as an experiment. It'll only take a week or two to see if it makes any difference, it won't do you any harm, and it could be life changing.

Anecdotes are crap and I'm not claiming this is proof of anything but I will tell you this, because it shocked the hell out of me: I stopped eating bread once, to support my partner who was cutting carbs lose weight. I wasn't overweight. I started to notice after 4 or 5 days that my lifelong acne was much improved. Within 2 weeks it was gone. I've not had skin problems since, although I do eat some bread now. If I want to get spots, I eat a loaf over a couple of days. Guaranteed. If I want to make my skin look amazing, I drop carbs to practically nothing for a few days.

Like I say, it's not proof of anything, but it's one of the reasons I advocate for experimenting with diet. Different things work for different people. Find what works for you by playing around.

If it is any comfort (or protection from the envy you are feeling), the people losing 12lb in a week from their obesity (well done to them!) might reach your weight eventually; if they do, they will face the same slow struggle with the final pounds . You are ahead of them in your race and still moving down. :)

I have tried many things (including MFP) and found that low calorie diets tend to make me feel cold, slow and tired - as if my body just starts running on low-battery mode to make me save energy! Losing weight on this plan is - for me- very slow and difficult.

I've been much happier and more successful with low-carbing (with the support of the group on here). I suspect there is something hormonal about it for me. I was so carb-heavy in all my eating before and thought this would be impossible but it is fine.

I hope that you find a way that works for you. We are all different.

@Halfadamnlb

That's impressive *@shenanigans5* you've done really well.

Can I ask what symptoms you had that lead to your diagnosis?

My GP isn't enthusiastic about investigating further than offering me contraceptive pills which only make things worse (for me)

Yes sure- I’d always had fairly irregular periods- anywhere from 35 to 60 days. I also am slightly on the hairy side (although not really significantly on the face). I felt quite unbalanced hormonally- would have really sore lumpy boobs for a lot of the time rather than just a week or so before my period. I would get hot sweats for a few days before my period and a few days afterwards. I gained weight easily and found it hard to lose.

I didn’t ever have acne and I did find my symptoms were relieved a bit by being on the pill.

The sonographer thought the degree of cysts was mild to moderate which may explain my relative mild symptoms. I know some people with pcos only ovulate very occasionally whereas I found it relatively ok to get pregnant (but I was lighter then so my pcos was under really good control).

Give less carbs more protein and veg and good try and I bet you never look back. It’s been life changing for me. I’m not no carb I eat some carbs but try for wholemeal and sensible amounts.

On MFP if you cook a lot from scratch but follow recipes, you can often enter the recipe on the app - it recognises a LOT of websites/recipe books etc.
If you're entering calories from the front of packaging (I think you referenced a cottage pie?) are you sure you're entering the right number - 526 sounds like a portion, not the whole pie.

And are you weighing your carbs? You mentioned reducing your portion sizes, but it amazes me the number of people who cook pasta/rice etc by eye, but then have no idea how much they're cooking. The recommended serving size is usually something like 75g of dry pasta, which looks nothing. It's easy to eat an extra 10-20g of pasta without even thinking about it. Same for cereal - the recommended portion size is usually about 30g but no-one has any idea what that looks like!

If you have a fitness watch of some description which picks up your heart rate you can get a much better estimate of how many calories you're burning. I bet there are loads of unwanted Xmas presents on ebay right now. I disagree with the poster who said you have to get really breathless and sweaty for walking to 'count'. Not true. You need to elevate your heartrate for sure, but walking at a decent pace can be one of the best exercises to aid weight loss. But your height/weight/fitness will make a massive difference to how many calories you're burning. (To give you an example - I run with a friend who is about 8 inches taller than me, and whilst we have the same build, she clearly weighs more. We have the same level of fitness and are about the same age. If we run 10 miles together, at exactly the same speed, and we're both recording our run on the same model of watch, she will typically burn about 150 calories more than me. It's not that scientific, but gives you an indication of how MFP can't just tell you how many calories your walk is burning off).

Clearly weight loss comes mainly from diet, but exercise alongside it is great for you anyway, and can help with maintenance. I'd suggest tracking your exercise on a specific app (like Strava) - does MFP draw data from there? I can't remember. Or how about joining one of the many virtual challenges as motivation. A friend of mine challenged herself to walk 1,000 miles in 2019 (which she did), and then signed up for a 'virtual' Land's End to John O'Groats in 2020 (c1,100 miles) - the app shows where you are on your journey etc. And it's a great motivator to just go out and do that little bit more to work towards your target.

Definitely ditch the Ovaltine it's basically a cup of cake. And I get it, I love it too, there were sachets of it in my Bounty Bag when my DS was born and I got hooked on it for a while. And it probably was good and replenishing when I was getting over major surgery and blood loss while breastfeeding a giant newborn. But it was a huge problem when I was putting my older baby down for his nap and having a cup of cake with my slice of cake and comforting myself on my tighter jeans by saying 9 months on, 9 months off.

If you are going to eat dairy, eat full fat. Low fat/skimmed dairy is nonsense. It's a more processed food, has higher levels of sugar and most importantly, eating fat does not make you fat. Especially for women. We need to consume natural fats. They will only make you put on weight if you eat too much. Eating a good amount of fat actually boosts your metabolism and aids weight loss/healthy maintenance.

My advice is to cut out processed sugar but eat all the fruit and veg you want. Fill up more on protein than carbohydrates. Full fat Greek yoghurt and fruit (stew the fruit if you can't face a cold breakfast/supper) or egg based meals are great. I replaced pasta with lentil pasta. Mainly because regular pasta makes me painfully constipated but lentil pasta doesn't. As a bonus it's loaded with protein, it's more tasty and you fill up on less of it.

Definitely don't count your exercise calories. There is a strong possibility that you are overestimating them but even still, if you don't feel an urgent need to replace them don't. I do endurance/ultra-endurance training and I don't go out of my way to replace the calories lost. As I don't eat a lot of processed sugar (which I very easily get addicted to) I eat pretty intuitively and in normal life you will find lots of opportunities to over eat. Meals out, take-aways, meeting a friend in a cafe etc. I eat normally despite exercise (if my calorie burn is over 1500, realistically I'm going to need to replace that within an hour or so) and then that calorie deficit "frees me up" to eat what I like socially. It's not something I set out to do, it's just the pattern I've fallen into.

Anyone else really want an ovaltine now? 😂

Definitely ditch the Ovaltine it's basically a cup of cake. And I get it, I love it too, there were sachets of it in my Bounty Bag when my DS was born and I got hooked on it for a while

The reason we love stuff like this is because our bodies actively want to put on weight. They are trying to do it, like we are all trying to put money in our savings accounts. They will manipulate us into eating stuff that gets them fattest. Our bodies want one thing, and our brains want the opposite. There's no wonder it's a problem for a lot of people. The issue, really, is availability. There's no problem with having a body that wants all the sugar it can get when all that's available is some fruit on the trees in autumn. And that's been the case for the whoooooole evolution of our bodies, until very very recently.

@Littlelapwing

Anyone else really want an ovaltine now? 😂

Well, if you're putting the kettle on...

I do understand what you're saying and yes it is frustrating but... if you're doing all that and you've only lost 0.5lb, that isn't a lot. I'm not overweight but when I've been losing weight before I would expect to lose around 2lb per week. I'm sorry if this is unwelcome advice and do feel free to ignore me (obviously there are reasons why weight loss may be slower for some rather than others) but you might need to look at what you're doing. Exercise doesn't usually make a huge difference and it's more about what you're consuming. Just because something is healthy, doesn't mean it isn't calorific or full of healthy fat. Both of those might be slowing you down.

Anyway, I see what you're saying. It's not unreasonable. But it might make you feel better if you'd managed to lose a little bit more. 2lb a week is generally accepted as sustainable weight loss.